Monthly Archives: November 2010

I am excited to announce the publication of my first guest piece on an etiquette blog, Clise Etiquette!

The author of the blog, Arden Clise, is the well-known Seattle authority on business etiquette. As the founder of Clise Etiquette, Arden works as an etiquette consultant, speaker and business etiquette columnist for the Puget Sound Business Journal.

Arden and I share a passion for all matters of decorum, from table manners to thank-you notes, so when she asked me to write about navigating the differences between East Coast and West Coast etiquette, I didn’t hesitate.

Prince William asked his girlfriend of eight years, Kate Middleton, to marry him.

To put my current previous obsession with Wills in perspective, consider this: my friend Amy sent me a text at 4:11AM telling me the news.

Because news like this cannot wait.

Because she knows I’ve been waiting for it.

And because she knows I need to hear it from no one but her.

This is a woman who once collected every article written about Princess Diana for an entire year. They were all kept under her bed, stacks and stacks of magazines and newspaper clippings of every detail of her life and tragic death. I would go over to her house across the street and we’d pull them all out and stare at hundreds of photos. We knew her life story, her family dynamics, her best dresses, her worst hairstyles.

So, you could say it was picture perfect that a Prince William obsessor should get a 4AM text from a Princess Di obsessor.

We were 13 at the time, however, so it might seem silly that we care at age 26. It might.

But I am not concerned with silliness, because I absolutely love royal weddings, and this one should prove to be more fantastic than the rest. I cannot wait to see what style of dress she will choose, how decorated his suit will be, how many people will line the streets of London hoping to catch a glimpse.

Kate is already moving up my ladder of style icons. People may joke about her over-the-top headpieces and formal hats, but I think they’re divine. If it were even in the vicinity of socially acceptable in the States, I’d be sporting one every chance I got.

Given my propensity for formality and etiquette, I am eager to see the royal wedding process unfold. I already admire their delayed announcement and press call, so the couple could have some private time to celebrate. And in an age of reality TV and totally lack of privacy, I respect their decision not to share the details of how he proposed.

These are the times when I mourn my lack of celebrity. If I were at least a successful actress or daughter of a President, I might have a chance at an invitation. As a Seattleite with no claim to fame, I probably won’t need to watch the mail too closely.

Which really is a shame, because I would have rocked a killer headpiece for that event.

On Friday at work I dressed as a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. I was Michelangelo, for obvious, husband-related reasons. My entire team dressed up and we actually won a contest for Best Cube Decoration. We made our cubicle aisle into a sewer.

Allow me to illustrate:

That is a pizza box on the right. We were detailed. And that is why we are the proud owners of a $100 gift card to Chili’s. Yes, Chili’s.

We quickly did some research to discover the Chili’s gift card would also work at Macaroni Grill or Maggianos. Needless to say, we were all relieved.

A few things to note:

1. I have nunchucks.
2. I have a cardboard shell.
3. Splinter is in life-size poster form.

Clearly you can’t win contests by doing things half-way.

On Saturday evening Mike and I went to two parties, and I was dressed as a banana. Mike was a sock monkey. We both thought this was hilarious until we showed up at the first party and we were the only people in costume.

Later some other people showed up in costume, but I hardly consider a kitten-ears headband a costume when I am literally inside a polyester banana.

As we were driving to the second party, it occurred to me that this humiliation might happen again. Not in the same way, since we knew everyone at the next event would be in costume, but in the sense that my costume was decidedly funny, and I knew every other woman’s costume would be decidedly whorish.

After we parked, I turned to Mike in the car and said, “I’m afraid.”

“Of what?”

“Of everyone being ‘the sexy something’ and me being the not-even-remotely attractive fruit.”

He didn’t hesitate, “You need to walk in there and OWN IT. Your costume is hilarious and so much more fun than the cliché “hot nurse” or whatever the girls are wearing tonight. OWN IT.”

So that’s what I did. I walked in and struck a pose and people totally responded. They laughed, and I realized that was much more fun than looking trampy on Halloween.

This isn’t a judgement on those who look sexy on Halloween — it’s totally cultural and virtually everyone does it. I just discovered that men don’t corner the market on silly rather than slutty.

In fact, you could argue that my costume was a little sexy-banana-ish, considering I was wearing black leggings and knee-high boots. However, when one realizes my costume came from Pottery Barn Kids, it loses its sex appeal significantly.

Now that I know I am no longer afraid to be a food paired with an animal, the possibilities are endless. Horse and carrot? Cow and grass? Elephant and peanut?